Frá Undir Vatni
by FromTheAeroplaneOverTheSea
Summary: Annette lives in an underwater utopia made of boarding schools, books, and a thick but totally healthy layer of denial. Li Xiao lives on a cloud of forced responsibility, calculated caring, and an uncanny ability to figure people out. Eventually, their worlds collide. The aftermath is catostrophic. ((Full summary inside))
1. Chapter 1: A Girl of Stone and Ice

**Summary: **Meet Annette Steilsdottir, an aquaphobic artist who drowned herself in fancy boarding schools, the fantasy section of the New York City Public Library, and a thick but totally healthy layer of denial. She hasn't come up for air in eight years and has no intention to. Some things need to stay underwater. Annette considers herself to be one of them.

Meet Li Xiao Wang, an ex-acrophobic martial arts and video game prodigy who views the world from the distant cloud of forced responsibility, calculated caring, and an uncanny ability to solve people like they're jigsaw puzzles. He's been trying to stay in the real world with little to no success, and is one corpse away from giving up on the idea entirely.

Eventually, their worlds collide. The aftermath is catastrophic.

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><p><strong>AN**: Hello, fair readers! Welcome to Frá Undir Vatni. This story idea has been floating around in my head as two separate story ideas for a while, but I stuck them together to see what would happen. Hopefully it's good. Remember, reviews are food and I'm always hungry :)

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><p>The birth of Annette Steilsdottir was an event as exciting as the earthquake that occurred on the same day, which is to say it was cause of minor damage for half of a day and an interesting story for half of a week before it grew dull to talk about and was only brought up a couple of times during the years following, until it was eventually forgotten all together. The hospital was in a panic and the nurses were anxious and her mother was pushing and pushing and pushing, her body desperate to rid itself of the parasite that had latched onto it for nine months. After a while, out came little Annette, covered in blood and screaming with all the force her little lungs had. She would never scream quite like that again in her life.<p>

Once she was clean and silent and in the arms of her mother, family members were brought into the room. Her birth father was first, a man her mother despised. She had left him for her lover the moment she discovered she was pregnant, and the divorce was finalized a week later. Her real father patted her head and looked into her eyes. They were not his eyes. He left as quickly and wordlessly as he arrived.

Then it was her son, Lukas. He was Thomassen property now, taken in the agreement. He was excited to see his little sister, more excited than she ever saw him. He climbed into the bed and kissed his mother on the cheek before taking his little sister into his arms. More than his mother or his father, the little girl looked like her brother.

"What's her name?" He asked, his eyes not moving from the bundle in his arms. She reached up and put her chubby arms around his neck, opening her mouth and making a pleased little sound.

"I don't know yet. Why don't you choose it?" She asked, figuring that she owed Lukas that. According to the documents, he was never going to see the girl again after this moment.

He thought about names and all the ones he had seen. All week, he had looked at names and thought of ones that would suit his sister. Lukas had narrowed it down to three, and looking at her narrowed it down to just one. "Annette."

"Annette?" She parroted, smiling softly.

"Annette." He confirmed, all the pride a seven-year-old could contain coming through in the name. "Do you like that name, Annette?" The baby made the same pleased little noise and wiggled closer to him, which he took as a yes.

"It's a wonderful name." His mother told him, her smile becoming more genuine as she spotted her soon-to-be-husband walking through the doors. "Annette Steilsdottir."

"But shouldn't her surname be-"

"She's your daughter now." The woman told him, and he came over to kiss his lover before trying to hold his step-daughter. Lukas tugged her away from him, holding her close.

"Lukie, why don't you let me see her?" He asked, trying to seem as much of a charming father as he could.

"My name is Lukas." The boy said poutily. "And why should you? She's _my_ sister?"

"And she's his daughter. Let him see Annette, Lukas." His mother demanded, glaring at him. As much as she should have loved him, Lukas drove her up the wall with his stubbornness and silence. Hopefully this child would be more agreeable.

"Fine." He agreed huffily. Then he looked at his sister and smiled before kissing her forehead. "See ya soon, Nettie." Lukas then handed the child back to his mother and left the room. If he had known the specifics of the agreement and that he was supposed to never see her again, he wouldn't had left. He would have ran out of the hospital with Annette in his arms.

The rest of the day was spent cooing over the child who seemed disinterested in most of the people surrounding her. When her mother slept, the child remained awake but silent, its eyes staring emptily at the ceiling. Her soon-to-be-step-father smiled down at the girl. Already, she seemed to be made of stone.

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><p>The next seven years passed in a constant scream that felt like a silence. Fighting, making up, fighting, making up, fighting, the occasional moving out only to move right back in, more fighting, more making up, a dizzying merry-go-round that seemed to never end. Annette watched the relationship wax and wan with a quiet fear, trying to be as little of a problem as possible.<p>

Fear was not the only thing she felt quietly. Almost everything she did was quiet, much to the anger of her mother. She wanted a loud, cheerful, outgoing little girl who wore frilly dresses. Instead she got Annette, who preferred to read and watch and hide and only came out of her shell when pressed by someone she liked. It drove her mother mad, and reminded her insufferably of Lukas. This did not go unnoticed by the Icelander. Sometimes, Annette thought her mother hated her. It bothered her, but it didn't hurt. Nothing hurt her. That's what Papa told her, anyways.

Papa told her that she was made of stone and ice and pure strength. He told her that her silence was good, that it made her better at listening. He told her that her reading was good, that it made her smarter than the average bear. Everything about her was good in the eyes of Papa, who technically wasn't her real father at all but felt more like a parent than either one of her real ones.

Even when he was angry, she couldn't be too upset with him. "It will make you stronger." He promised before he slapped her or pushed her or put her hand in scorching water. Eventually, she learned that he made it hurt worse if she screamed or cried. The day she stayed perfectly silent through her punishment was one of the proudest days of her step-father's life.

In the middle of one of the more troublesome periods, there came a reprieve. A little cabin in Colorado, offered to the family for a month. Papa took it, much to the joy of the young girl. There were promises of swimming and fishing and exploring and fun, just the three of them. She loved that phrase. Just us, just you and me and mama. She liked "Just you and me" even more. The night before the trip, she repeated it over and over.

The promise was true for a week. The three went hiking and fished and played Monopoly when they came back to the cabin. It was perfect, absolutely perfect in every possible way. Until the eighth day.

Annette woke up later than usual and left her bedroom, planning to get herself some waffles before heading out on the adventure of the day. Maybe they'd go swimming again in the lake just a few feet away or head up one of the many mountains. She had pointed out all of the ones she had wanted to climb on the plane ride over, and her step-father wrote each one down carefully. Before she heard the arguing of her parents, she was hoping to head up the one that had a section of white rock in the middle.

But they were fighting, standing in the kitchen and bickering over burnt toast.

"God damn it Marc, can't you do _anything _right?" Her mother asked, shoving the burnt food in his face.

"Yes, yes I can." He defended, glaring at her. Annette lingered in the doorway, hoping to remain out of sight.

"Like what? All you do is have sex with _me _and eat _my_ food and enjoy the cabin of _my _friends and leech off of _me_ like a useless fucking parasite." She pointed a spatula at his throat. "That's what you are. A useless fucking parasite."

"You want to know what I can do right? I can raise your daughter, Veronika. That's what I can do right. I can raise her a helluva lot better than you can, and I do." Marc pushed her away, the spatula landing on the floor with a loud clatter.

"Oh, you can?" Annette heard her mother laugh, a high and cruel sound that made her shiver. "Really? Is that what you call what you do to her? You think I don't know? Trust me babe, I _know_. I know where she gets all of those bruises and cuts and burns. Do you think I'm dumb? I know what you do to that little girl. You think that's raising her? You're a monster."

"I'm a monster?" Papa laughed at that, a sound that she normally enjoyed but now made her blood run cold. "Why don't you ask your daughter who the monster is? She loves me. Not you, me. Everything I do is to make her smarter, stronger, sweeter...and a better woman than you. That's why I stay with you, you passive-aggressive cunt. Because I love Annette."

The young girl watched her mother smirk, leaning against the stove. "If you love her so much, why don't you fuck her?"

Annette didn't understand what that word meant, but she heard her mother say it a lot. It was one of the words she wasn't allowed to say. She saw that it made Papa awful angry though, because he punched the wall and then grabbed her mother. "You bitch. You awful, awful bitch. How dare you suggest that?" The words came out as a roar that made the young girl clamp her hands over her ears.

"I suggest it because it's true. Maybe not now, but when she gets older, it will be. You always say how pretty she is, don't you? What's going to happen when she gets curves, gets boobs, gets...urges? I know what's gonna happen." She smirked that all-knowing smirk and laughed that high, cold laugh that her daughter didn't understand.

"And you have the nerve to call me a monster." He shook his head and let go of her before seeing a flash of white in the corner of his vision. "Annette..." Papa walked towards her, regret in his eyes.

"What does that mean, Papa?" She asked shyly, half-hidden behind the door.

"It means your mommy's a monster, Ann." He then turned towards his wife, as if getting an idea. "One day, she's gonna show you just how much of a monster she is."

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><p>Hands.<p>

That was the next thing Annette would remember. Everything after the fight would be hidden in her memory except for the hands.

Warm hands, white hands, hands that were clean. Hands with red nail polish and nails that dug into her shoulders.

The hands of her mother, holding her daughter under the water.

She kicked wildly, trying to swim back up to the surface. Water was getting in her lungs and she couldn't breathe and she felt like her head was going to explode if she didn't get to the surface _right now, _but no matter how hard she kicked, the force above her did not falter.

_Die, _she thought.

_I'm going to die_.

_I'm going to **die.**_

_**I'M**_

_**GOING**_

_**TO**_

_**DIE.**_

And then she did.

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><p>When Annette died, she did not bet on waking up.<p>

But she woke up in a hospital bed with no memory of the event that had occurred except for her the hands that she recognized as her mother's and the feeling that she was dying.

She was no longer dying, though. She was alive and okay, but there was a tube down her throat and blankets all around her. Annette tried to scream, but couldn't.

"Shhhh, honey. The tube's just for getting the water all out. It won't hurt a bit if you stay still." The nurse holding her hand promised, stroking it softly. Annette tried not to move and ignore the extreme discomfort, instead squeezing the hand of the nurse as hard as she could. Removing the tube was worse because that nurse had hands with nail polish like her mother's and so she kept squirming away. She did manage to get it out though, and the first thing Annette did when the tube was out of her throat was let out one sob, just one, before retreating back into her blankets.

The next few hours were a flurry of sameness. Doctors and nurses ran around and tried to get her warm with more blankets and soup and in the case of the nurse who held her hand earlier, a hug. No visitors were allowed, but she kept asking to see her Papa. That was the only thing she would say. She had to warn him about Mother and what she did so that he would stay away from her.

"Can I see Papa now?" She asked the nurse that hugged her and held her hand. That nurse was the only one left in the room.

"Of course, sweetie. I have a question for you, though." The nurse sat down in a chair beside the bed. "What happened to your hands?"

Annette looked at her hands at the mention of them. They were covered in burns from hot water and her wrists had cigarette burns that reminded her of the moon. No one had ever asked her about them upfront because she always wore gloves, and she had never been told what to say about them, so she said the truth. "Papa gave them to me." She admitted, holding out her hands. "He said that they'd make me strong and brave."

The nurse nodded and left the room before talking to the doctor. Annette couldn't hear what they were saying, but they looked unhappy. Then she saw her father walk down the hall, but he was stopped by the doctor and the nurse. Then she could hear her father, yelling and saying that he didn't do it. Then there were security officers and Annette screeched and hopped up, only to be held down by the IVs in her hand that refused to let her go more than a few feet from the machines. She struggled against it, trying to get to him. Even when he was gone, she kept struggling until the doctor put a needle in her arm that made her eyes grow heavy and she fell asleep within moments.

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><p>Annette was awoken a few hours later to the feeling of someone kissing her. Her eyes sprung open and the boy stopped kissing her before smiling victoriously.<p>

"See!" He said, turning to the other two children in the room. "I told you it would work!"

"Not fair. Uncle Yao said the medicine was wearing off, so she probably would've woken up anyway." The girl said poutily, fussing with the flower in her hair.

"Why'd you kiss me?" Annette asked, wiping her lips furiously.

"Cause Alfred said that heroes were American, but everyone knows that heroes are really from South Korea so he said that I had to prove it by kissing a princess to wake her up. And then Uncle said that he had to work again and we had to come with him again and I saw him say that you were sleeping and Mei said you looked like a princess, so I kissed you and now you're up. Which means that I'm the hero, not him!" He babbled happily, puffing out his chest and posing in a way he thought made him look like a hero but actually made him look like a dork.

The girl who Annette assumed was Mei giggled. "You look like a looooooooser."

"Do not!" He insisted.

"Do to!" She shot back, sticking out her tongue.

"Didn't Alfred say that if the princess woke up that you had to marry her?" The other boy asked.

"Yeah, but we're too young to get married." The boy shrugged. "I hope you aren't mad that I'm not gonna marry you."

"I don't mind. I don't think I want to marry you all that much, anyhow." She rubbed her eyes. "Who are you?"

"I'm Mei." The girl announced, waving cheerfully and stepping closer to her. "And these are my cousins, Im Yong Soo and Li Xiao."

"I'm Annette." She introduced, sitting up in the bed.

"Are you a real princess?" Yong Soo asked.

"I don't think so."

"Aw. Well, I count you as one." He sat down in one of the chairs, his legs swinging back and forth.

Li Xiao sat down as well, looking at the silver-haired girl with an intensity that made her uncomfortable. His eyes were drawn to her hands. They were burnt and scarred and hideous but somehow extremely mesmerizing. "Why are you here?"

"Um..." Annette shifted away from him slightly, not sure exactly hosting say it. She didn't want to talk about what had happened, she just wanted to forget it.

"It's okay if you don't wanna talk 'bout it. I was asking cause you don't look very sick." He interjected once he noticed how uncomfortable she was.

"I don't think I'm sick." She confirmed as a doctor walked into the room.

"Children, what did I say about bothering the patients?" The man said, turning to the three kids.

"That we should make friends with them and bother than a lot?" Yong Soo said cheekily, smiling up at the man.

"Not quite, little terror. What am I going to do with you three? Go to my office." He shook his head at the children who all head for the door after giving a resigned "Yes, Uncle Yao."

"Sorry about my nephews and niece, Miss Steilsdottir." He apologized, picking up her chart and looking through it.

"It's okay. They were funny." She told him, smiling because no one had ever called her Miss Steilsdottir before in her life and it made her feel like she was somebody important.

"I'm glad they were not too bothersome, aru. Your birth father and your brother are on their way here from New York. They'll be taking you there soon. Everything in the cabin has already been packed, and your step-grandmother is already packing your things in Iceland. No need to worry." The doctor told her as he checked the numbers on the machines that she didn't understand and probably never would.

"Where's Papa? Why aren't I going home with him? Where did your people take him yesterday?" She shot off all three questions in rapid-fire succession, eagerly awaiting her answers.

"He is in jail, little one. He hurt you many, many times. That is against the law, both here and in Iceland."

"Oh." She seemed to deflate at that news, shrinking back into her blankets and hiding her face behind her hair.

There wasn't much to be said after that, so she attempted to close her eyes only to find that she was too nervous to sleep. Who was this man, her birth father? Her mother spoke of him rarely and only in hateful tones. Her papa didn't like him either. Already, Annette didn't trust him. If neither one of the great authority figures in her life liked him, then she figured that he must be horrible.

And her brother...The idea of an older brother had always seemed nice, but it might be messy in practice. "You're just like your brother," was what her mother would say when Annette was being difficult but other than that, not much was said of him. Annette didn't even know his name.

She did not know how long she laid there and tried to fall asleep, but the silence ended eventually. It ended with the opening of a door, a man with thinning blond hair striding into the room like he owned it, and an expressionless teen at his heels. When she looked at the younger one, the one who must be her brother, he actually smiled. It did not look like something he was accustomed to doing.

"Hello." He said, walking towards his sister. "I'm Lukas."

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><p>Later, after all the discharge papers were signed and all of her things in the car, she was told the news. Her mother was dead. Her step-father was in jail and would never get out, not if the Tomassen's had anything to do with it. It was her father who gave the news, staring at the road with a dead expression that Lukas had mirrored before he looked at her. When she buried her face in her hands and cried, his expression did not change.<p>

Years afterwards, she would learn the truth. Her mother tried to drown her, something she remembered. She then shot herself, something she did not remember. Her papa came outside when he heard the gunshot and called an ambulance. He gave her CPR, but she didn't wake up for him. Then he gave his step-daughter CPR, and she didn't wake up, either. According to witness, he was crying. Annette never remembered him crying. It was a sign of weakness, after all.

For all of his supposed strength, he could not avoid his prison sentance. Twelve years in jail with the possibility of parole at six with a three-year probation period. He got out on parole and was living somewhere in Europe that was far from New York, which is where Annette lived now. She tried to live happily. She failed more often than not.

Her birth father tucked her away in boarding school, not wanting to deal with a daughter. Im Yong Soo and Mei attended the same school. Neither one seemed to remember her, something she was grateful for. It allowed her to be friends with them and Kim An and Michelle and Elise without having to remember. All in all, that part of her history seemed to be dead and gone and never coming back, except for one small matter that manifested itself in the form of Li Xiao Wang.

Li remembered the incident. It had played a major role in his life. His uncle had told him what happened after he nagged him, and that was the day Li Xiao learned that people could be monsters and heroes at the same time. The story was imprinted in his mind along with her face. He didn't know what about it bothered him so much, but it bothered him. After a while, he decided that it was the fact that from what he had seen in her photos, Mei's roommate bore a striking resemblance to her. Every time she sent a selfie with her roommate in the background, he'd be reminded of the other girl he knew with hair like that. It couldn't be her, though. That would be too cliché, like a plot twist in one of those dumb soap operas that his uncle binge-watched when he thought Li wasn't around.

He thought the story to be over until his uncle enrolled him in the same boarding school as his cousins one warm May day after he had gotten expelled from an academy in China for setting off fireworks during math class. It was the day before classes began when he saw the silver-haired girl walk into the common without her infamous gloves on her hands that Li finally put two and two together to make an unlikely but nonetheless existent four.


	2. Chapter 2: Making Four

A/N: I'm going to apologize in advance. I'm really sick right now and this chapter is not my best. I'll edit the living crap out of it later, but until then, (try to) enjoy. Sorry.

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><p>Annette honestly had no clue how people lived their lives without gloves. She felt deeply uncomfortable without the fabric covering her hands and protecting them from the world, like she was walking around naked. And she certainly wouldn't walk into the common room naked, so why would she walk into the common room without gloves? It was that simple of a thought process for her. Except that she was walking into the common room sans her gloves. Normally, such an idea would have never entered her mind, so why now? The answer was simple: The gloves she wore would inevitably be ruined today.<p>

It was a day before classes tradition. Every year, Michelle would forget which boys were gay and try to flirt with them, Yong Soo would hug one of the teachers because he'd think that they were a student, and Annette would ruin a pair of gloves.

Between moving boxes, couches, televisions, dressers, and God knows what else from the main lobby into the dorm, her gloves would always get stained, cut open, or otherwise horribly disfigured. Moving was one of those tasks that gloves just couldn't be used with. Still, she tried for three years in a row. She had also failed for three years in a row. So it goes.

Annette walked into the common room without her gloves, but was careful to keep her hands out of sight by holding underside of the box. If someone looked, they would see the ugly scars that she still thought were signs of weakness. All she could do was hope nobody would pay attention. People were good at not paying attention.

"Annette!" Mei called out, waving happily. She was lounging on one of the couches, sitting next to an Asian guy who was faced away from the Icelander. At the sound of Mei's voice, he turned towards her. Something about his expression reminded Annette of shock, but it was masked so quickly that she doubted that she had seen it. "Come here! You have to meet my cousin."

"Nice to see you too, Mei-Mei." She rolled her eyes before setting down the box for a moment and stuffing her hands in her pockets.

"Of course it is!" The Taiwanese girl hopped up to embrace her friend, and Annette returned the hug awkwardly and put her hands back in her pockets the moment it was over. "So, this is my cousin, Li Xiao. He used to go to a boarding school in Hong Kong, but he got expelled."

"Technically, I was asked to leave in order to maintain order." The boy (who Annette assumed was Li Xiao) corrected. For a second, he seemed to be a stranger, and then she remembered. He was the other boy at the hospital, the one who asked what happened. Hopefully he locked the incident away in the part of the brain where memories of childhood go like the other two.

"And is that what you put on your record when you hacked into their school system three months ago?" Mei retorted, smiling like she had won something.

"Absolutely not." Li smirked. "So, you're Annette?" He turned his attentions to the other girl, the smirk dropping from his face.

"I'm fairly sure that I am." She retorted, trying to gauge if there was a small chance he remembered when they met before. Irritatingly enough, she couldn't tell.

"And what are the chances that you're just an extremely well-made robot replacement sent to take over our galaxy?"

"Slim to none. Good theory, though. I promise I'm not a robot, it's being filled with loathing for humanity that looks like this."

He scoffed quietly, shaking his head. "Loathing for humanity and Skyr. Interesting composition."

"How'd you know about-"

"Because you turned Mei over to Skyr obsession and the dark side."

"Ah, yes, the whole dark side thing. I am not a mere student but a wanton mistress of the night who uses Icelandic yoghurt/cheese combinations to turn your cousin over to the dark side. Next, she'll be blowing up buildings and making out with shady, mustachioed men for three goats." Annette raised and eyebrow before picking up the box. If she had gloves on, she would have done a sarcastic sort of jazz hands that she picked up during Michelle's musical obsession phase

"Oh my god. I've created a _monster_." Mei moaned dramatically. "And I'd like to think I'm worth more than three goats."

"Don't worry, cousin dearest. You're worth at least five." Li reassured her before taking the box from Annette's hands and heading towards the dorms.

The Taiwanese girl sighed before scrambling up to stop Michelle from flirting with Feliciano because his boyfriend would possibly beat the shit out of her, blurring out a dramatic "Chelle, don't!" This left Annette to follow after Li Xiao and her things, heading down the hall.

"You don't have to carry my things, you know." She informed once she caught up to him, briefly taking a hand out of her pocket to fix her silvery waves before it vanished again.

"I know. I want to." He said simply. "You room with Mei and Chelle and the others, right?"

"Mhmm. It's number 23." She told him, watching the passing numbers.

For a few moments, they walked in silence. The door to the dorm was already open and a few things were scattered across it. Judging by the objects, neither Elise or Kim An had shown up but she could see which beds had already been claimed.

"You look familiar." Li said suddenly, putting the box down on one of the empty beds.

"I hope that I would. I get dragged into your cousin's photos often enough."

"No, not from there, but from...before."

"Before." Annette repeated, a hint of mocking making its way into her voice. "From before what?"

"From before boarding school." Li Xiao clarified, and then he got an idea that could confirm his suspicions. In their brief conversation, he got a sense for her style. She responded quickly and sharply, not showing any clear emotion but not sounding totally empty either. And so, logically speaking, something that made her uncomfortable would turn that on its head. "Do you remember Colorado?"

"Nope." She replied, not looking at him and instead beginning to empty to box. Her answer was quick and clipped, no thought given to it. It was obviously a lie, but not in the style he would have expected.

"Really?" He confirmed, walking over to help her. Li couldn't see Annette's face, hidden as it was beneath her silvery hair. He wanted to move it away, to tuck it behind her ear so that he could see what was going on underneath the veil.

Annette nodded. "Really."

Now, he had two options. He could call her out on her bluff, insist that she was lying and bring up what happened, or he could let it slide and slowly coerce the story out of her over however long they'd be here together. Option one would possibly ruin any chance of a friendship with this strange girl, and he'd have to deal with her being angry at him for the remainder of their time in school together. Option two would take longer, but it might yield more a successful result. The better choice was clear. "Okay."

"Do _you _remember Colorado?"

"I do."

"Okay." Annette said nothing more after that, and Li Xiao couldn't bring himself to break the silence. Before he left the dorm to go get more boxes, he grabbed one of her hands, brought it to his lips, and kissed it. Then he left the room. Annette did not follow him.

* * *

><p>After everyone had arrived and gotten unpacked, Annette put her gloves back on,grabbed her messenger bag, and left the school. She promised to stop by her brother's apartment for dinner. Even though it was easily a twenty minute bike ride, she was allowed to go. Everyone was allowed to leave school grounds if a) you signed out at the front desk, b) you stayed within city limits, and c) you were back before your grade's curfew, which was 10:30 for Annette. Next year, it would be 10:30, and then senior year would be 11:00. It was a system, 15 more minutes of being allowed in the world for every grade. It was a nice system, and it let her visit fairly often.<p>

She grabbed her bike from the bike rack by the student parking lot and head down the familiar streets. Annette could find her way to Lukas's apartment blindfolded and deaf. She knew which streets had red lights you could bike through and which ones you had to stop out; she knew where tourists tended to flock to and at what times they flocked there; she knew New York as well as she had once known Reykjavik, possibly even better.

She stopped outside of Chez Francis, which was the best pastry shop in the whole of New York and possibly the world. Since Lukas never let her near the stove (Annette had a tendency to cook terrifying things that she thought were delicious and gave everyone else nightmares),she normally stopped at Chez Francis to pick up dessert.

It was run by her half-cousin, Francis, who was irritating.y cheerful but always gave her discounts on pastries and taught her how to speak French. On days when Lukas and her father were busy and she was too little to be sent to boarding school, she spent time in the kitchen of Chez Francis, reading and taste-testing and being somewhat happy. The place seemed to radiate the hopeful bliss she felt as a child sitting in the sugar-coated floor, and it was one of the few places that could make her smile.

As she predicted it would be, the restaurant was busy. The line was almost out the door, and she waited for thirty minutes before she left and decided that she would come back after she ate. No one even saw her leave. If anyone did, they didn't care.

When she got to Lukas's, breathless and tired and with a small scrape on her calf from a near-death experience involving a taxi and a pigeon, she checked her phone. It had gone off during her ride, but she hadn't stopped to answer it. Annette opened the text message.

_Can't make dinner, have to study_.

That was all he wrote. No apology, no promise for dinner another day, nothing. It wasn't even a complete sentance. She wished that she was surprised or upset instead of just resigned. She wished that she could go into the apartment anyhow or sit on the kitchen floor of Chez Francis or go to her dorm and binge-watch whatever shitty movie she found on Netflix. But Lukas locked his door and he had yet to give Annette a key, Francis was busy with customers, and Li Xiao would almost certainly be in the dorm and there was no way in hell she was dealing with him. It was safer to ride around the city until her legs ached and her lungs felt minutes away from collapse and curfew was two hours passed. It was safer to sneak into her dorm through the window and avoid the people at the desk and the questions they would ask. If any of them came searching for her tomorrow, she would say that she just forgot to sign back in, no big deal. But none of them would. She had broken curfew enough to know that they didn't care.

When she entered through the window, no one woke up. Usually somebody woke up, but not tonight. Annette didn't know how long she stood in the darkness, waiting for somebody to ask where she had been. She only slid into bed once she was certain none of them would. As she fell asleep, she tried to decide if she was relieved or disappointed that nobody asked her anything. She was asleep before she had a clear answer.


End file.
